Ninja Swordsmanship

"Now that I've said all that, experience it for yourself!" As soon as he finished speaking, Orochimaru rapidly formed hand seals.

The scene before Shuichi's eyes abruptly changed, and he found himself standing on a battlefield littered with corpses.

When he looked down, he saw Ishikawa Tatsuki and Yūhi Kurenai lying in pools of blood. Their mangled bodies were especially horrifying, as though they had been blasted by artillery shells. Their human forms were barely recognizable.

The scene shifted, and Shuichi seemed to return to his previous world. He stood in the middle of a road, watching vehicles pass by.

"Beep, beep...!" A deafening horn sounded beside his ear as a Mud Truck sped toward an SUV on the other side, ready to crush it.

Shuichi recognized it. It was his family's car from his previous life. For an instant, he could even see his parents and siblings inside.

"Boom!" The Mud Truck failed to stop and crashed down onto the SUV with tremendous momentum...

"Crack!" The scene before him began to shatter. Orochimaru stood right in front of him. Shuichi had both hands held before his chest in the Ram seal and let out a soft breath. He had just dispelled the genjutsu.

"You dispelled it fairly quickly, but that was only a D-rank Hell Viewing Technique. It seems your talent for genjutsu is quite high, Shuichi-kun. Next is the C-rank one." Orochimaru was not surprised in the slightest as he cast another genjutsu on Shuichi.

Damn, did he have to be this ruthless...? Before Shuichi could even fully react, he was dragged into another genjutsu.

The final month of that year was undoubtedly the most miserable period since Shuichi had begun training. Orochimaru taught him many times that month, and often cast genjutsu on Shuichi before they had even met.

He would also frequently cast genjutsu on Shuichi halfway through a conversation. Shuichi had not been tormented to the point of wishing for death, but he was still mentally and physically exhausted.

Under Orochimaru's repeated tempering, Shuichi's genjutsu skills improved by the day. So long as he did not encounter an Uchiha's Three-Tomoe Sharingan, genjutsu from anyone else in the Ninja World posed little threat to him.

In terms of a ninja's fundamentals, Shuichi truly stood above his peers. However, he was still one crucial step away from becoming a real ninja.

"Starting next year, the missions will definitely involve killing people. I'll also have to face the cruel world Outside the Village. Am I mentally prepared for that?" Shuichi knew he would have to face this hurdle sooner or later.

He had a feeling that, given Orochimaru's teaching style, if his hesitation put his life in danger, Orochimaru definitely would not save him.

There was little he could do at home now. To keep his first kill from affecting his combat ability, Shuichi could only imagine bloody, flesh-and-bone-splattering scenes from movies in his previous life, hoping to adapt quickly when the time came to kill.

Time entered Year 44 of Konoha. For Shuichi, who was all alone, there was nothing to celebrate.

However, during this New Year, he took the initiative to visit several of his friends' homes. In the Ninja World, no one could achieve absolute perfection alone. Ninjas needed to trust in the strength of others.

Although none of his peers possessed Shuichi's talent or potential, life was unpredictable. Perhaps one day in the future, his companions might save his life.

Naturally, he had not forgotten Kakashi, who was also alone. Just a few days after the New Year, Shuichi went to Kakashi's home to see him.

"It's you. What do you want?" When Shuichi saw Kakashi again, he still wore that expressionless face.

From Shuichi's perspective, Kakashi no longer seemed as grief-stricken as he had been before. The matter of White Fang might still be a thorn in Kakashi's heart, but after Shuichi's advice, it was better than the extreme situation in the original story.

"Mm. Aside from wishing you a happy New Year, there are also some training matters I'd like to discuss with you." Shuichi knew that the best way to communicate more with Kakashi was to talk about ninja training.

"Last year, I received one of my father's belongings, a Short Sword. But I have no idea how to begin learning swordsmanship, so I wanted to ask for your guidance."

Shuichi had considered this carefully. Although ninjas primarily used Chakra, swordsmanship was currently the most commonly used offensive method throughout the Ninja World.

The Third Shinobi War was especially close at hand. When it came, the battlefield would not be a series of one-on-one fights. Prolonged and bitter combat would be unavoidable.

Ninjas would inevitably fight at close range as well. Shuichi was already proficient in ninjutsu, taijutsu, and genjutsu, but in close combat, he often did little more than slash twice with a Kunai, which had limited lethality.

That was why he needed to properly master swordsmanship, a method with low Chakra consumption and high killing efficiency.

"Teacher Orochimaru has taught me quite a few ninjutsu lately, and he also gave me special genjutsu training. You probably haven't had much experience like that, right?"

"How about it? We can help each other. I can practice while helping you train your genjutsu abilities." This was indeed what Shuichi genuinely thought. He and Kakashi could complement each other well at the moment.

There were no missions around the New Year anyway, so Kakashi naturally agreed to something that could improve his strength.

After reaching an agreement with Kakashi, Shuichi deliberately went to the ninja tool shop owned by his childhood friend Takashima Shota's family and had his father's sword polished again.

By the values of his previous life, it might have been an important keepsake. But the Ninja World was extraordinarily dangerous. If he died one day, keepsakes would lose all meaning. It was better to use it now to improve his combat strength.

In the days that followed, Shuichi and Kakashi arranged a time to train together every day. Neither held anything back, and they taught each other all their techniques.

After Kakashi introduced the methods of sword use in the current Ninja World, Shuichi gained a comprehensive understanding of it.

There were none of the complicated moves he had imagined. The Hatake clan's swordsmanship consisted of conventional techniques—chopping, wiping, lifting, thrusting, intercepting, and so on—with no fixed forms.

Kakashi told Shuichi that ninjas were very different from the samurai of the past. Sword techniques centered around one-hit kills, such as Iaido Slash, were not well suited to a ninja's system.

With Chakra enhancing them, ninjas focused on High Mobility in battle. The complicated forms and routines of the past had no room to shine in such fights.

Aside from a handful of samurai in the Land of Iron, swordsmanship in other ninja villages also relied on relatively simple moves.

The important differences lay in Chakra-enhanced movement techniques, Nature Transformation enhancements, visual interference, and the like.

Taking the Hatake clan's swordsmanship as an example, its core was speed and fluidity of movement. White Fang's swordsmanship combined a ninja's Body Flicker Technique, Lightning Element Chakra Nature Transformation, and plain, unadorned sword techniques.

Thus, Shuichi found that swordsmanship was not particularly difficult. It was unexpectedly similar to the combat style in anime.

The process often focused on the lethality of the first strike upon closing in. In most cases, one could only alter the attack at most twice afterward.

After exchanging one or two blows, both sides would generally pull apart in time. Changing sword techniques while standing in place was not advisable, because anyone who stayed still on the battlefield was a target. Ninjutsu and ninja tools would swarm in from every direction.

Kakashi's teaching was not complicated. He first taught Shuichi how to exert force most effectively with these sword techniques, then explained what to watch out for when quickly closing distance and how to change moves after the first strike.

After several days of continuous sparring with Kakashi, Shuichi had preliminarily mastered the techniques of ninja swordsmanship without using Chakra.

As for using swordsmanship effectively in actual combat to injure enemies, that depended more on predicting an enemy's movements and coordinating it with one's Chakra techniques. It required greater adaptability.